


You Can Talk To Me

by Cleotrix



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Character Study, Cullen is a dork, F/M, Scratch that they're both dorks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-02
Updated: 2015-12-02
Packaged: 2018-05-04 13:21:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5335610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cleotrix/pseuds/Cleotrix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After believing with all her heart that she was chosen by Andraste, the Inquisitor suffers a crisis of faith when confronted with the truth. So she goes to her friend the Commander, to talk and be comforted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Can Talk To Me

It was a sunny afternoon in Skyhold. Warm, or as warm as it could get on the top of a snow covered peak. There was the usual ambient noise of birds, people talking, and the clanking of shifting armor. Magnified by hundreds, then spread out over a castle and thin mountain air.

Cullen was removed from the hubbub, working at his desk, in his tower. There was an endless amount of work to do for the Inquisition. He had only stopped taking Lyrium a week ago, and the effects were not bad yet. A constant headache, but no weakness or shaking. He was feeling... off, though. There was a knock on the door, and the Inquisitor poked her head inside.

"Cullen, can I talk to you a moment?"

"Of course, Inquisitor, what is it?"

There was the beginning of a pause, but then she spoke, softly. "I'm scared Cullen."

"Of what, Corypheus?" He made a sort-of move to stand.

"No. Yes. I don't know. I'm _terrified_. And I don't know why."

Cullen examined the elf. She was small and terribly thin. All elves were. Sometimes she looked so fragile he thought her arm would break if she bumped it into a door frame. She was standing with her arms curled in front of herself, her back a little hunched, hands straining against each other. Her wide, pale face not tilted high enough to look him in the eyes. Cullen got up from his desk and came to stand before her, close enough to take her hurting hands, but not daring too.

"I'm sorry." She whispered, "I'm trying to be strong, but I don't know who else I could to talk to."

"You can talk to me." He said. It was true.

"I'm not the Herald." Her voice broke on the words.

Cullen did not know what to say. Shya was biting her lips, and looking anywhere but at him and he thought one wrong word might break her, and felt only wrong words bumbling around in his head. He kept his quiet, and listened.

"I don't know why, I don't know how I could have been so _foolish_ , but I really believed. I didn't remember what happened at the Conclave, but I remembered a golden woman in the Fade, hand held out to me, and when I woke up I was marked by providence. Everyone around me saying Andraste herself chose me, that they saw her too. And I believed them."

She turned away from him, holding her own shoulders even tighter, before taking a breath and sliding down the wall to sit on the stone floor, face bent to her knees.

"The Elven Creator Gods have been locked away by the trickster and the seat of the maker is empty, so the stories go. And I thought there was no reason both stories couldn't be a form of truth. But maybe Andraste cares, I thought. And if the Burned Woman chose a dalish mage to do her work, then how bad could she be? Maybe she was worth following. I was her Herald, and I would serve her well. There was no point in questioning it, it was all so impossible. What right did I have to think myself beneath her notice, if she chose me. ...Everyone was so sure." She said the last line wistfully.

Cullen went to kneel before her, still unsure of what to do, or how to comfort, but feeling certain at least, that closeness was right.

"There was nothing I couldn't do." Shya continued. "With every rift I closed it got easier. People followed me, and we solved problems, over and over again. We helped so many people. I believed in the Inquisition. It seemed exactly what we needed, at exactly the right time. We were going to heal the world, one batch of elfroot at a time."

Shya lifted her head and looked to Cullen's face. Her huge eyes were glistening.

"But it was all a lie! I'm a nothing and a no one, just some pathetic freak in the wrong place at the right time. And this _gift_ -" She spat, holding out her shining palm. "-was an accident. And now everyone knows it. Andraste is with the maker, wherever he is. And I'm just a girl. What am I doing? Who am I trying to kid?"

Her voice became smaller and softer and sadder as she trailed off.

Cullen was shocked. To say he had no idea of the turmoil the Inquisitor had been dealing with would be an understatement. In the days following the siege at Adamant, the Inquisitor had shown little sign of being rattled by her visit to the fade. It had been a victory.

 _Just a girl_ , she had said. She was only twenty three, a fact he had known and never thought much about. What did her age matter? She was the Herald. A miracle. She was strong and smart and merciful and fearless, jumping off every staircase and rooftop in Skyhold because she couldn't be bothered to take the long way down. She was everything Thedas needed. But how could he make her see that?

"I'm sorry for your loss."

She blinked up at him. Wisps of platinum hair floated about her face, pulled free from her twist of braids by the vigorous rubbing at her temples. 

"My loss?" Her confusion seemed to momentarily break through the veil of self pity and resignation.

"Yes. The loss of your faith." He spoke slowly, firmly, softly, certain. He could do this.

"Oh. Yes, I suppose so."

"But regardless of how you feel, you are the Inquisitor, and you must lead us."

"How can I? When I've lost all my confidence and certainty. It was all because of the Mark. My whole life I never had any before."

"I didn't see Andraste in the fade. A few soldiers, maybe, saw the form of a glowing woman. But the people wanted to believe."

"Because I closed the Breach. Mere happenstance the mark is on my hand."

"For centuries there has been no sign, no miracles, nothing to prove there even was a Maker. And the world is used to that. But the Breach, the demons- it was the end of days. And you were a miracle."

"An accident."

"But people believed _anyway_." Cullen took her hand. "That's what faith is. No one can tell you what you know in your heart of hearts. The people chose you to be the Inquisitor because of all you've done.

"If you were never the Herald, then everything you've done, you've done on your own. You closed the breach, you saved the templars and the wardens and the empress. You staved off civil war, and laughed in the face of demons, and saved so many lives and inspired every single soldier in these freezing mountains. And you can do more great things. We can do great things. But we can't do them without you. The Inquisition will collapse without you as a symbol to rally behind. Whether Andraste herself lead you out of the fade, or she sent a spirit to help you, or she's not real, you are spreading her teachings, just by following them. If you want to be the Herald, herald her. There's nothing more you can do, the gods are mysteries we may never know. Just do the best you can."

"...Maybe." She said finally. "But I don't know how to make decisions anymore. Before, whatever I chose I knew was the right answer, because Andraste chose me, so all I did, all I was, had been pre-approved by her. Now, I'm lost."

"If you have no confidence, then pretend."

"What do you mean?"

"Think back to the beginning, before you closed the breach the first time." Cassandra had spoken to him of that moment, in desperation, asking the prisoner for advice, and having her speak with command, for them to work together to rescue the soldiers lost in the mountain pass. "You made the choice when Cassandra asked. How?"

"I don't know. It just seemed like the best option."

"And your first session with the war council? All your new intimidating advisors asking what to do?"

"I just tried to pick whatever sounded best. I didn't know what I was doing."

"Let me tell you a secret. Nobody ever knows what they're doing. It doesn't matter. We followed your orders, and we got results. It doesn't matter if you're sure, you make the right decisions. You've already proven yourself."

He stood, her hands in his. She rose with him.

"We are all here to support you, just as we have been doing. Lean on us, put on a brave face and keep making the decisions like you have for the past months. You'll remember what you're capable of in no time. Maybe go find another dragon to kill, really help your ego."

She smiled at him, and he felt what might have been a tiny lurch in his chest, right where his heart was. Then she nodded. The fierceness in her face he had come to find so familiar was still missing, but she was standing tall again. On an impulse he would spend days shocked at himself for following through with, he pulled Shya into a hug. Her tiny, firm form molded against him.

The embrace was a comfort to both, and they let it last. After some time, Shya released the grip she was keeping on her own hands clasped behind the Commander's back. He loosened his hold as she did, but brought his gloved hands up to cup her face. Her eyes were clear and bright. He never, ever tired of looking at her.

Her face was wide and flat, her head proportionally larger to her body than a human's, the bridge of her nose didn't indent. Her delicate vallaslin tattoos, soft green branching lines spread over her forehead, under her huge slanted eyes, and coming from underneath her chin in a line across her lips. It always took people a moment to figure out what it was that made her look so exotic, because the tattoos cover her brow-bone, but she shaved her eyebrows. He asked her why once.

 _"I shaved them off to get my vallaslin, then I really liked the way I looked without them. Smoother, I guess."_ She had laughed then, as if to protect herself from ridicule.

 _"I like it."_ He had said. _She smiled, and nodded and bit her lip._

_"I do too." He smirked._

_"You said that already."_

In the present, with this wonderful, powerful, beautiful woman in front of him, looking at him like he was her saving grace, Cullen was struck by the intense desire to kiss her. He managed to mostly stop himself, pressing his mouth gently to her forehead instead, and nothing more forward than that. But when he pulled away completely, he saw that look in her eye, that he had seen before. She took a half step forward, further into his space.

  
And he wanted to, he did. He cared so deeply for this woman. But he couldn't. He was too old. He wished he was younger. Still innocent, and unspoiled, unbroken and uncorrupted. Before the demons came, before she left. But he couldn't love anyone now. And all the better, because the Inquisitor needed a commander of her forces, not a stuttering fool templar child no help to anyone. But he didn't need to push her away, not yet, not tonight. She stepped back.

"Thank you, Cullen. So much." She squeezed his shoulder.

"Anything for you." He said, smiling. Her eyes widened. _Dammit_. He cursed silently. _You were doing so well, what was that?_ There was a pause.

"Well, I'm off." The she-elf said liltingly.

"Yeah." He said throatily.

She turned to leave, then kept turning, to face him as she backed out of the room. "Gonna... head out to Crestwood. Saw a dragon down there last time."

Cullen grinned. "Perfect." Then cringed internally.

"I'll see you when I get back?" She asked.

He spread his arms, indicating his general long-suffering existence in this particular tower. "I'll be around."

She smiled one last blinding time, and whirled away, the door closing behind her. Cullen sank into his desk chair.

"That went... well. I think. Oh, who am I kidding." He groaned. " _Perfect?_ I'm an idiot."

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this a full year ago, halfway through my first playthrough. And I finally have the courage to share it!
> 
> I decided upon begining my game that I didn't have the energy to expend my roleplaying efforts on the conflict of whether or not my character was actually the Herald of Andraste. So I just had her accept it. This backfired upon her trip to the fade and meeting the spirit of Justinia. I ending up spending so much roleplaying effort on trying to figure out what her mental state was that I decided to just work through it myself. Since I was romancing Cullen, he seemed the best candidate for a sounding board. 
> 
> This is my first fanfiction and I'm so excited! Also, if you tell me nice things in the comments it will make me happy:)


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